Atlanta hospital to receive Ebola patient

Handling infectious diseases requires extreme caution

Two Americans diagnosed with the Ebola virus are being airlifted from West Africa to the USA. Emory Hospital in Atlanta has a specially built isolation unit set up in collaboration with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to treat patients who are exposed to certain serious infectious diseases. The CDC is not aware of a case of Ebola ever being treated here, but five people in the past decade have entered the country with either Lassa Fever or Marburg Fever, hemorrhagic fevers similar to Ebola.

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CDC and USA TODAY research

Janet Loehrke and Anne R. Carey, USA TODAY

Michael King, WXIA-TV, Atlanta
2:19 p.m. CDT August 1, 2014

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Tom Frieden announced Thursday a travel alert advising against non-essential travel to Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia because of the Ebola outbreak.(Photo: MANDEL NGAN, AFP/Getty Images)

Emory Hospital in Atlanta has been chosen to house at least one of the two American patients infected with Ebola. The hospital is equipped with a special facility containment and the public should not be concerned, says one medical expert.
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In a release, the Atlanta hospital said they have a specially built isolation unit set up in collaboration with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to treat patients who are exposed to certain serious infectious diseases. The facility, they said, is physically separate from other patient areas of the hospital and is equipped to provide an extremely high level of clinical isolation.

A medical transport plane departed the United States on Thursday afternoon, headed to Liberia to pick up an American Ebola patient.

Two American medical missionaries working with Ebola patients in Liberia have been diagnosed with the virus. Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol, who worked at a medical center operated by the North Carolina-based Samaritan's Purse, were listed in stable but grave condition, according to a statement from the organization.

CDC Director Dr. Thomas Frieden said he doubted Ebola could spread in the United States. "That is not in the cards," he told reporters Thursday.

Liberian health workers wear protective gear on the way to bury a woman who died of the Ebola virus in Foya, Liberia, July 2.(Photo: Ahmed Jallanzo, epa)

State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said the federal government was helping organize any needed evacuations.

"The State Department, together with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which has the lead for the U.S. government in the Ebola situation, is working to facilitate access to aviation services for medical evacuations for U.S. citizens directly affected by the current Ebola outbreak in West Africa," Harf told NBC News.

"If and when that happens ... every precaution will be taken to move the patients safety and securely to provide critical care en route and to maintain strict isolation upon arrival in the United States," she added.